Let's get ready to rumble

Fascinating lawsuit filed by Joseph DeMaria against DOJ and American Express. Here's the Herald article and the complaint. From the article:

Sergio Masvidal, the successful scion of a once-penniless Cuban exile family, says he just wants the Justice Department to give him back his name.

Masvidal says he also wants his former employer, American Express, to pay him more than $7.5 million for ruining his career as a top global banker based in Miami.

The former chairman of American Express Bank International claims he's a ``scapegoat'' in a lawsuit filed Friday that depicts the Justice Department and his ex-employer as partners in an illegal conspiracy plotted at the same time that American Express was prosecuted for violating anti-money-laundering reporting laws.

``It's important to me that my name is cleared,'' said Masvidal, 63 who came to this country in the early 1960s under the Catholic Church's ``Pedro Pan'' relocation program. ``It's important that I don't end my career with this event defining my life.''

According to the complaint, there was a secret agreement entered into between the government and American Express that sold out Masvidal:

The August 2007 prosecution agreement between American Express Bank International and the Justice Department has caused Masvidal many sleepless nights -- but not because of the costly terms of that deal.
Masvidal has obtained evidence of what he describes as a ``secret termination agreement'' between his ex-employer and the Justice Department. It says that Masvidal and American Express Bank International's president, Simon E. Amich, would be fired after the sale of the bank, implying wrongdoing on their part. The side agreement -- an August 2007 letter signed by American Express and Justice Department lawyers -- was never disclosed to Masvidal, Amich or to U.S. District Judge William Zloch in Fort Lauderdale, who approved the so-called ``deferred'' prosecution agreement.
Under that settlement, American Express had to pay the government $65 million for its lax enforcement of compliance laws aimed at catching drug-trafficking and other tainted bank deposits. It was one of the largest fines imposed on a U.S. bank. Under the terms, the Justice Department filed criminal charges against the bank but agreed to dismiss them in one year if the international bank subsidiary strengthened its safeguards against money laundering.

I notice that John Sellers represented DOJ against American Express; he's the same prosecutor in the Ben Kuehne case.

Happy Weekend

Some Friday afternoon tunes:

Tweet Tweet

John Pacenti has a piece in the DBR today about lawyers tweeting. As far as I can tell, lawyers and Twitter have not been a successful pairing so far because most lawyers are trying to damn hard to use it for marketing instead of for fun. Following most lawyers on Twitter is deathly boring -- it's much more fun to follow Chad Ochocinco.

The article quotes a bunch of lawyers, but doesn't have Brian Tannebaum, probably the most prolific tweeter, who just tweeted his vacation. Brian has been writing a bunch on the problems with lawyers trying to use Twitter (here's his most recent post). I think Brian is a tad too critical of lawyers who try to market themselves on Twitter. I don't think there is any danger to it... I think like anything else: people who aren't good at what they do aren't going to get business, no matter how much they tweet.

Back to Pacenti. Here's his list of do's and don't for tweeters:

DO understand professional demographics. Tax lawyers seek out accountants; criminal attorneys follow expert witnesses and jury experts.
DON’T follow more than 100 people than are following you.
DO get yourself placed on a list of lawyers to follow on Twitter.
DON’T use Twitter as a marketing tool.
DON’T try to solicit business or make sales.
DO use applications like Tweetdeck to filter topics, create groups and maximize efficiency.
DON’T tweet more than 10 times a day or more than five times an hour.
DO publicize speaking events, tconferences and blog items.
DON’T tweet anything that can’t be quoted in the news.

My feeling is that if you have to read a list of DOs and DON'Ts for something like Twitter, it probably isn't for you. As for me, I still have my Twitter page, so come follow me.

Scalia likes My Cousin Vinny and Marisa Tomei

Here's a piece of the article (HT: ABL):

Before signing copies of his book, Making Your Case: The Art of Persuading Judges, (which came out more than a year ago) Scalia dished a few pointers to the spillover crowd of mostly senior citizens who gathered at the Friendship Heights Village Center in Chevy Chase, Md. "Don't beat a dead horse," the justice advised lawyers who are making oral arguments. "Be brief. And when your time expires, shut up and sit down."

To make his point, Scalia said the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist "used to stop you mid-sentence when the red light went on" in the Supreme Court.

Another pet peeve? Acronyms in brief writing and oral arguments, Scalia said, advising lawyers "Don't burden your reader." In the book, co-authored by Bryan Garner, the two also recommend that lawyers study a judge's background and likes and dislikes before they appear in court. "At the very least, these details will humanize the judge before you, so that you will be arguing to a human being instead of a chair."

On My Cousin Vinny and Marisa Tomei:

But he did get some hearty laughter when he was asked to reveal what his favorite legal movie is.

Scalia didn't hesitate: "My Cousin Vinny," he replied. "I can watch that over and over again."

Then, speaking about the character actress Marisa Tomei played in the movie, Scalia added, "God, she's a killer."

Monday Night videos

The Fins looked dreadful.

Rumpole's picks look worse.

What's with the 10:30pm late game?

Here are some videos for those of you who are waiting for game 2 to start:

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"In Mr. Conway’s case, the post that got him in trouble questioned the motives and competence of Judge Cheryl Aleman, and appeared on a rowdy blog"

Sean Conway and the Broward Blog made the front page of Sunday New York Times. Very cool!! (Our prior Conway coverage is here.)

And it's timely -- the article addresses an issue that we have been discussing on the blog recently: how far can lawyers go in criticizing judges?

Here's the intro to the article:

Sean Conway was steamed at a Fort Lauderdale judge, so he did what millions of angry people do these days: he blogged about her, saying she was an “Evil, Unfair Witch.”

But Mr. Conway is a lawyer. And unlike millions of other online hotheads, he found himself hauled up before the Florida bar, which in April issued a reprimand and a fine for his intemperate blog post.

Mr. Conway is hardly the only lawyer to have taken to online social media like Facebook, Twitter and blogs, but as officers of the court they face special risks. Their freedom to gripe is limited by codes of conduct.

“When you become an officer of the court, you lose the full ability to criticize the court,” said Michael Downey, who teaches legal ethics at the Washington University law school.

And with thousands of blogs and so many lawyers online, legal ethics experts say that collisions between the freewheeling ways of the Internet and the tight boundaries of legal discourse are inevitable — whether they result in damaged careers or simply raise eyebrows.

James Hendrick resentenced to probation

Our prior coverage of the case is here. You remember this one -- the 11th Circuit reversed Judge Highsmith's sentence of probation for James Hendrick, "once Monroe County's powerful government attorney." Well, he was resentenced today before Judge Zloch (because Highsmith retired) and got probation, again. From the Herald article:

U.S. District Judge William Zloch gave Hendrick credit for time already served on probation. That leaves two years and seven months of probation -- nine months of which must be spent under house arrest at Hendrick's home in Key West.
Hendrick had faced up to two-plus years in prison after a federal appeals court upheld his convictions in April but threw out his five-year probationary sentence, saying the punishment wasn't tough enough to fit the crime.
A three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, siding with the government, said Hendrick's sentence was ``unreasonable.'' The court in Atlanta sent the case back to South Florida for resentencing.
But Friday, Zloch essentially adopted the sentence of the trial judge in the case, retired U.S. District Judge Shelby Highsmith -- with the house arrest added on. Zloch also imposed a $50,000 fine and 1,500 hours of community service.
Hendrick, whose hearing was attended by dozens of relatives and supporters, said he was ``relieved'' by the judge's sentence.
``I did wrong, and I should pay for it,'' he told The Miami Herald. ``The currency I should pay with is community service.''
Prosecutor Christopher Clark said the U.S. Attorney's Office will consider whether to appeal.

I'd be surprised if the government appealed again. Judge Zloch went through all of the 3553 factors, so an appeal will be almost impossible for the government. And the appellate analysis from the 11th Circuit didn't rule out the same sentence. In fact, the 11th didn't say much of anything:

The government cross-appeals Hendrick’s below-guidelines sentence. After carefully reviewing the record and considering the arguments that the parties briefed and orally argued, we agree with the government that the sentence is both procedurally and substantively unreasonable. We accordingly vacate it and remand for resentencing.

Enjoy your weekend.

"Miami's ex-DEA chief charged with shredding documents for disgraced banker Allen Stanford"

That's the headline from this Miami Herald article about Tom Raffanello, who was Stanford's security chief after leaving the DEA five years ago. The superceding indictment, which added Raffanello, was filed today. Interestingly, the co-defendant's case is set for trial September 18. Raffanello's lawyer Kendall Coffee filed a speedy trial demand today when the superceding indictment was filed saying that he is prepared to try the case with the co-defendant on September 18 even though the indictment was only issued today. The pleading says that the "unusual case" is "a serious mistake" and that Raffanello was simply throwing out the garbage and was not at all obstructing justice. He claims that all of the paper documents that were shredded have electronic backups which were maintained and that there is absolutely no motive or reason that he would shred documents to obstruct an investigation. From the Herald:

The 61-year-old former DEA chief said he was prepared to turn himself over to federal agents Friday on charges of conspiracy and obstruction.
``No one is sorrier than me that it came to this -- after spending 32 ½ years working for the government,'' he told The Miami Herald. ``But I'm prepared to fight this. I still believe in the system.''

This should be an interesting one. The case is assigned to Judge Zloch.